


Hey You're An Artist Right

by quicksparrows



Series: Illustrated Collaborations with Emmy [2]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: paint me like one of your faerghus girls
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-30
Updated: 2019-10-30
Packaged: 2021-01-12 22:56:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21233960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quicksparrows/pseuds/quicksparrows
Summary: Ignatz, artist, is set upon by a commission request from Sylvain, drunk.[With illustration.]





	Hey You're An Artist Right

**Author's Note:**

> Emmy: [watching Bojack Horseman] That painting!!  
Me: Sylvain would have that.  
Emmy: ... Oh my god.
> 
> text by yours truly, art by [Emmy](https://twitter.com/chickenbabby)

🎨

Ignatz had not envisioned his day ending with Sylvain knocking on his door at some unholy hour and asking an odd question: “Hey, you like art, right?”

“I do,” Ignatz said, reluctantly. It wasn’t because he was ashamed or secretive about his interest — he was, after all, a war painter by profession — but he had heard many things about Sylvain and could not imagine there was any overlap with him, much less his art. It was a little bit confusing, too, because while they'd only in the same house for a month before the war started, he figured anyone would assume that a war painter, by profession and creed, _liked _art.

Sylvain smiled at him, and Ignatz remarked: “That’s a rather strange question to ask a war painter...”

“Well, I’m_ looking_ for a painter,” Sylvain said. He grinned, scrubbing a hand through his hair and tousling it magnificently. He seemed the slightest bit... how to put it politely? _Merry?_ “I’d like to commission you, actually."

Ignatz did not know why, but he felt alarm. This was not the kind of alarm he felt when strangers asked if he could draw them, or the exhaustion he felt when someone asked him for lessons they inevitably would not follow through with.

It was the indescribable alarm of knowing the war was over, and he still needed to keep a roof over his head, and that his desire to be clothed and fed was about to clash against his disinterest in drawing naked women.

“I’m afraid I don’t do private commissions,” Ignatz said, apologetically. “My work is primarily in the field... I just paint what I see. If you’d like to commission a portrait of your, um, lover... I know a few people that may be interested.”

"Lover?" Sylvain asked, confused. "No, I want you to paint _me."_

"Oh," Ignatz said. He felt a flush creep up the back of his neck. "I'm afraid the answer is still the same. I don't really do portraiture..."

Sylvain laughed, bright and loud. He leant against Ingatz's doorframe, and his smile was more than a little sly.

"Hey, Ignatz, come on," he said, and he gestured down at himself. “Am I not a landscape to behold?"

He posed. He wore very tight high-waisted breeches that made his shoulders look about twice as broad, and as he gestured, he shifted his weight to stand contrapposto. Ignatz was not sure if it was deliberate or a coincidence.

Merry was too generous, Ignatz thought. Maybe drunk was a little better.

“I’m sure I could recommend someone who would be happy to paint you,” Ignatz said, “but that’s really not what I do.”

“How much?” Sylvain asked.

Ignatz wasn’t sure how visibly he cringed. That was a dangerous game; even he had a price, but Sylvain was a nobleman, and Ignatz didn’t know how deep his pockets went. He didn’t want to seem arrogant about his work for giving a very high number, but...

“Five thousand gold,” Ignatz said. That was enough for a poor family to get by on for a month. Too high, surely, to attract one of Sylvain’s passing fancies.

“I’ll pay you ten if we do this right here, right now,” Sylvain grinned.

Ignatz came dangerously close to speaking words unfit for the Goddess’s Holy and All-Hearing Ears. Instead he gulped and smiled.

“I... suppose... my evening is free...”

“Great,” Sylvain said, and he invited himself in, clapping Ignatz on the shoulder as he passed.

What in Fodlan’s nuts had Ignatz gotten himself into?

🎨

Ignatz’s temporary quarters in Enbarr were modest, at least as modest as a room in a palace was considered. He had not intended to stay for this long, but his return to the Alliance had been delayed a number of times as he watched the city develop post-war, and the Emperor had been generous in providing board and a modest stipend in exchange for his documentation of the changing landscape of the city.

He did not, as a general rule, have guests. It was his studio when the weather was poor, or when he’d gotten far enough into a painting to fill in the rest from memory. Canvases were stacked against all the walls, and his traveling paint kit — a large wooden box with slots for boards so they would not touch each other — was perpetually open and ready to be rearranged and taken out.

Sylvain let out a low whistle.

“You get a whole workshop, huh?” Sylvain said. “I just have a room.”

“This is my room, actually,” Ignatz said. He gestured at the bed, or at least what little was visible of it under a large unfinished canvas.

If Sylvain realized anything about the difference in their lodging, he didn’t even hint at it. He just laughed and continued looking around.

“Not a particularly lush setting for a sensual reclining nude, but it would have to make do,” Sylvain said. He untucked his shirt as he spoke and Ignatz had the striking sensation of being shot by his own arrow.

“N-nude?”

Sylvain grinned.

“What else did you think? If I wanted any old portrait I wouldn’t go to an old friend.”

“I really couldn’t, I’m not—“

“Call it fifteen?”

“—that kind of— okay.”

Sylvain stripped off his clothes right then and there with an ease to it that baffled Ignatz -- so much so that he found himself staring, which Sylvain didn't seem bothered by at all. He just undid the buttons at his cuffs while looking Ignatz dead in the eyes and then stripped off his shirt as though it were the most natural thing in the world. As he pulled his shirt over his head, he momentarily arced his back, and his abs were even _more_ prominent under taut skin.

"Why don't you do portraits?" he remarked. "I thought there'd be good money in it. All these nobles want to immortalize themselves."

"Ah," Ignatz trailed, and as Sylvain undid his belt and the buttons of his trousers, he felt compelled to look away for religious reasons. He also had to set up his paints. He continued, a little quieter: "I want to capture Fodlan's history... and I believe that the actions of the people are more important than the people themselves."

"That's true," Sylvain said, thoughtfully, and Ignatz heard his trousers hit the floor.He supposed he would have to look eventually -- he couldn't paint a naked man without looking -- but with his eyes low he could see Sylvain was still in his stockings, so he still had time to come to terms with the situation. Sylvain carried on: "Well, I appreciate you doing this for me. I want to hang it on my wall, over my bed."

“I see,” Ignatz said. He selected a large canvas and set it upon the easel. He supposed if it was large enough, he wouldn’t see more than just Sylvain’s endlessly chattering head.

“Where do you want me?”

Ignatz tried to survey his room without seeing the Gautier family jewels. He did not succeed particularly well, but he did decided that for fifteen thousand gold, he could allow his couch to be defiled in some way. After a moment, he reflected on not wanting it to be defiled at all, so he fetched a blanket and draped it over the seat.

“Will that do?” Ignatz asked.

Sylvain did not answer. Ignatz dared turn and was rewarded with the image of Sylvain bent at the waist, fishing something out of his trousers. When he straightened up again, it was with a flask in his hand, and he took a quick swig.

Ignatz decided to ask for twenty.

“Oh,” Sylvain said, sounding a little unimpressed, but in a way that was trying and failing to be polite. “It’s not very heroic.”

Twenty-five.

“What would you prefer?” Ignatz asked.

Sylvain pondered it a moment, and then with the complete lack of awareness known only to the drunk, the foolish and the Gautier family, he began to rummage, naked, about Ignatz’s room.

Ignatz took a shaky breath in.

“I would appreciate it if you didn’t... don’t touch that, please... Sylvain...”

Ignatz knew he was being ignored, so he just sighed and started setting up his paints. Sylvain opened his trunk. From it, he found his inspiration: a bear skin rug.

Sylvain pulled it out with a gleeful smile.

“What is this?” he demanded. “It’s perfect.”

Ignatz felt himself giving up, but a query about the rug was at least a distraction to the naked man imposing on his evening (and his coffers.)

“It was a gift,” he said. It was from Leonie.

Sylvain threw it open over the couch and he immediately sprawled on top of it. He posed himself a little bit foolishly. Not that Ignatz knew much about the posing of sensuous beauties, but he didn’t imagine it looked so artless. If Sylvain weren’t a strapping man with thick muscle and beautiful dark red curls of body hair, there would be nothing artful about the scene at all.

_Goddess..._

“Is this good?” Sylvain asked. “Go on and give me direction, I want this to be perfect, and you’re the expert.”

Ignatz chuckled, despite himself.

“Hardly,” he said. “You’re not any landscape I’ve ever seen.”

“Ha!” Sylvain positively lounged, his long body stretched so far across the couch that his still-stockinged feet hung off the end. He threw an arm up over his head. “Is this good?”

“I think so,” Ignatz said. Truthfully, he had no idea. “Maybe...”

He didn’t know how to say it, so he just gestured with a hand. Sylvain mimicked him, and so he just leant over until Sylvain looked the slightest bit better. He then realized he was posing himself and he immediately sat back behind the canvas.

“You’re so cool, Ignatz,” Sylvain said. “Thanks for this.”

Ignatz was glad his face was hidden, because even after all that, that was what made his face turn red.

🎨

A week later, Ignatz knocked on Sylvain’s door, the finished painting tucked under his arm, wrapped in cloth so that no one would see the absurdity he had committed in paint. It was not the first time he had knocked on Sylvain’s door — it was the third. He was notoriously difficult to pin down, and even when he was in his room, the noises had prompted Ignatz to turn back.

Now, though, Sylvain answered the door. He was bedheaded and sleepy-eyed, but he looked surprised upon realizing who had come to call on him.

“Ignatz,” he said. “What brings you here?”

A damning reply if Ignatz had ever heard one. He hoped against all hope that Sylvain had simply wanted the experience and now was content to see the painting burned. Ignatz smiled tightly. He realized Sylvain was not wearing pants under his over-long sleeping shirt.

“I have your painting,” he said.

“My what?”

_Goddess_.

“The painting you commissioned me for,” Ignatz said, a little more pointedly. “I... your painting?”

Sylvain’s warm eyes were deep, deep pools of confusion.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he said. He paused, and then looked surprised. “Oh wait. Did that actually happen?” He burst out laughing. “Oh, shit...”

Ignatz felt as though he were on fire.

“Well, let’s see it,” Sylvain said. He took the canvas by its corner and tugged, and Ignatz let him have it. Sylvain walked away with it, deeper into his room, and he gestured for Ignatz to follow.

Despite his better judgment, Ignatz followed. He closed the door behind him and watched Sylvain set about unwrapping the cloth from the canvas. Ignatz was relieved to discover that Sylvain was wearing braies under the shirt, a fact which he only discovered when Sylvain crouched down. He would not have to pray so fervently tonight.

Sylvain dropped the cloth. He burst out laughing.

“Ignatz,” Sylvain said. He beamed up at Ignatz from his place on the floor, his grin incomparable, his joy palpable. He declared: “You are an _artist_!”

“That’s what they tell me,” Ignatz replied, low on his throat, but he secretly felt proud.

“You really get anatomy,” Sylvain said. “Like... wow. I was wondering how I’d lost track of so much money, but this? This was well spent. You must really like art, look at how lovingly this was rendered... you can see every hair."

“About that,” Ignatz said. “I wanted to return it to you... You were so drunk, and as strange as the situation was, I suppose it wasn’t all that bad...”

“Hey, no chance,” Sylvain replied. He stood up. His knees cracked when he did so, and then Ignatz felt his entire skeleton crack when Sylvain clapped him on the shoulder. “You earned it, little man...”

“Thanks...”

“Want to do another next week?” Sylvain joked. Ignatz walked away. “Ignatz? Hey? Do you—- bye, I guess?”

And that, of course, was the story of Ignatz’s first and last foray into nudes.

art by [Emmy](https://twitter.com/chickenbabby)


End file.
